Salon.com > The Revenant http://www.salon.com Sat, 25 May 2013 01:08:20 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 “The Revenant”: Zombies and vampires, via Tarantino http://www.salon.com/2012/08/22/the_revenant%e2%80%9d_zombies_and_vampires_via_tarantino/ http://www.salon.com/2012/08/22/the_revenant%e2%80%9d_zombies_and_vampires_via_tarantino/#comments Wed, 22 Aug 2012 22:45:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12989836 D. Kerry Prior’s gruesome and hilarious horror-comedy “The Revenant” was exactly what I needed in the dog days of August, and it might be what you need too. If there were any justice in the movie world, this sharp-witted and foulmouthed zombie-vampire-dude picture, armed with marvelously icky special effects, a smidgen of ’70-style nihilism and just a bit of political edge, would be a major Hollywood release supported by breathless magazine articles and geeky blog posts alike. Instead, “The Revenant” is a marketplace afterthought that’s been kicking around without a distributor for three years, and is finally receiving a brief summer look-see in theaters on the way to home video.

Sure, I see what some of the issues are – an absence of recognizable stars, most notably – and for the first few minutes you’re not quite sure what kind of movie this is, or who the main character will be. We begin with Bart Gregory (David Anders), a young soldier from California, who gets killed in a mysterious roadside ambush in Iraq. (I told you this was made in 2009!) Back in L.A. at Bart’s funeral, his weepy girlfriend, Janet (Louise Griffiths), and his drug-addled best friend, Joey (Chris Wylde), allow their alcohol-fueled grief to push them into a passionate makeout session. Does that event have something to do with the fact that, later that night, Bart will force open his coffin and dig his way back to the surface?

Continue Reading...

]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/08/22/the_revenant%e2%80%9d_zombies_and_vampires_via_tarantino/feed/ 8